God has blessed our efforts, and a village in Sierra Leone is getting fresh, safe water to drink, along with assistance in setting up the basic public sanitation we take for granted. Mercy Ships also provides the local people with the training and skills they need to maintain their new sanitation and water.

“I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink.” Matthew 25

Well, here are two more wonderful stories from Mercy Ships. Click on the links to see the pictures and read the full stories:

A Family Calls Out to God: When local doctors said they could do nothing for 18-month-old Cyrus, his parents cried out to God for a surgeon who could remove the tumor protruding from the infant’s neck. …. Their prayers were answered with news that a Mercy Ship was coming to Liberia. …. Once unable to even hold up his head, Cyrus now moves freely as he scrambles around on the floor of a hospital playroom, collecting bricks to build a tower. …. As his mother considers the answer to her prayers, she exclaims simply: “Praise God! Praise God! Praise God!”

My Son Has Life!: Finella recalls the reaction she faced after the birth of her son, Tamba, whose forehead was disfigured by a large tumor. “Throw the child away,” was the painful advice Finella received. Unwilling to abandon their suffering baby, Finella and her husband, Ishaka, took him from their village in Sierra Leone to Freetown, the capital. They spent their savings on useless medicines. …. Dr. Sandra Lako at the New Steps Centre, a Mercy Ships clinic in Freetown, helped them get to the Africa Mercy docked in Liberia, nearly 250 miles away, where surgeons saved the boy’s life. …. “I just cannot say thank you enough,” [Tamba’s father] says of Mercy Ships. “Financially I lost everything, but now my son has life.”

The cost has gone up from 10,000 to 20,000. Classes now run from 11AM to 1PM. And the schedule has changed from 6 weeks to 7 weeks, adding a visit to an orphanage on Day 3 so students can practice their new Korean language skills while giving children a visit.

everyone deserves a big thank you after our big push last week. with $500 short, everyone dug deep and we gave upward of $9oo dollars. with the left over money we can probably sponsor a world vision child outright for the whole of 2008. Praise God and thank you all for your generosity.

Attendance at Women’s Fellowship has fallen off since the Canadian girls left, which leads me to believe that the time and place don’t work well. Please post what times and days could work for you, what area you live in (i.e. “near the church” “near City Hall”, etc.), and whether or not you could possibly host.Maybe what we need is a couple of options for people who live in different areas. We shall see!